Naked

[written in July of ’07, this shall always and forever have a special place here and in my heart]

I had this label. It was large and sticky and I wore it loudly and proudly for 22 years. I bent over backwards not to conform to its connotations or stereotypes but I refused to give it up. I held tightly as a vestige of my refusal to give in to the norms expected of me.

Now I stand naked. You have rendered the safety of that label inadequate. I have no way of describing what I am now. I have consciously eschewed the long standing recognizable and more comfortable name attached to my name. “I’m a lesbian” doesn’t work anymore.

There was some notion that “lesbian” was more accepted. It needed no explanation. I date women. I love women. I tried men. I am…no, was…”lesbian”.

And then you came along. You ripped that sticky, gluey protective outer shell from me and jumped into my heart. You opened me up and with your eyes I saw a world that I never even gave another thought to. I didn’t expect you. Someone who struggled not with being gay but with being YOU. You defy all. There is no way to put you into a neat little category that I can easily explain.

I struggle with pronouns. I know you one way. Everyone else knows you another. You had accepted what seemed your fate. Now you know there are ways around it. You don’t have to live in the box you were born into (no pun intended).

We have grabbed each other and grown into something that burst out of conventional bounds and became something bigger than both of us. I can no longer say “I’m a lesbian”. If the world wants to think I’m gay or look at you and think that I might be straight I won’t bother to correct them.

We are nothing. We are something else. We are love and lust and we bring out desires within each other that we never knew existed. We respond to each other in the most amazing way. We are best friends, lovers, partners, and part of a family. At the altar, what will they say? I now pronounce you Don and Diana. To have and to hold from this day forward. To love each other all the days of our lives.

I stand naked before the masses. I can no longer fit into a nice neat category. No Dewey Decimal system for me. I stand with you and we stand alone. And although we may not fit in – we fit together. Welded into something new and precious and exciting and bold. A sweet discovery that my heart can’t be tied up by gender. I throw off the ties that bind